Ruger is now making polymer magazines for the Gunsite scout rifle. Â One of the complaints about the metal magazines was the price: Â $70 for the 10 round mag. Â I like the Gunsite scout rifle, but at $70/mag it is a non-starter for me. Â Sorry, but I’m not dropping $70 for a .308 rifle magazine.
Fortunately, Ruger wasn’t blind to the issue. Â To resolve the cost problem, Ruger is now manufacturing polymer magazines of three, five and ten round capacities. Â While not cheap, the polymer mags are much more reasonable at $39.95 each. Â I can’t say that a retail price of $40 is appealing, but it is certainly less horrific than $70.
The magazines use a polymer body and base with a stainless steel spring. Â The body of the magazines have a waffle pattern. Â Dust covers come with the magazines for storage, similar to the ones that Magpul provides with some of the Pmags. Â The magazine base is also polymer.
Ruger did a video of a small torture test on one of the magazines. Â The torture test wasn’t over-the-top tough, but whacking a mag with a baseball bat isn’t exactly treating them with kid gloves either. Â I do wish they would have shown the magazine being used in the gun after the abuse rather than just showing there were no cracks and the bullets appeared to feed correctly. Â Give us the full monte, so to speak.
Ruger uses Magpul magazines with the SR-556 rifles. Â I wonder if the company has contracted with Magpul to produce these magazines, or if Ruger is making these themselves. Â Ruger definitely deals in polymers, so it would not be necessary for them to contract out, but they are also running at capacity on the production lines now. Â It could be advantageous for them to field out the work just to keep maximum production on all of their other products.
